Star Spangled Magazine Covers

By Xah Lee. Date: . Last updated: .

Every so often you'll find the stars'n'stripes theme in various forms in American magazines: music mags, women's mags, photo mags, fashion mags, and political mags. Americans love it. In these mags, there are also abnormal frequency of the word America or American: American Fashion, Sex in America, America's sweetheart; while hardly ever other country or continent's name. For the average American, America = the world, and that's how Americans like it, and the capitalistic consummeristic America sells by it.

Does other country's magazines frequently cite their own country this or that? I think it's uniquely US phenomenon.

time mag 20041018
George W Bush vs John Kerry on Time magazine, 2004-10-18, cover illustration by Daniel Adel.
George mag cover Gisele Bundchen
Supermodel Gisele Bündchen on American political mag George, 2000-06.

For detail and more photos, see: Gisele Bundchen in US Flag Swimwear.

Bazaar 200102 Sarah Jessica Parker
Sara Jessica Parker on Bazaar cover, 2001-02.
Paper magazine cover
Paper magazine, showing a pretty girl (Ivana Miličević?) clad in red-white striped sundress with a button-pin of peace-sign on flag. (notable is her runway chest. US magazines usually sport chesty women.)
rolling stone 2001
2001-09-11 issue of Rolling Stone, showing a US flag brooch. Brooch is just called pin in US, and is a American thing.
vogue 200109 britney
Brat Britney Spears on Vogue
Lisa Marie gear
Actress Lisa Marie (born 1968) on Gear.
Jaime Bergman  gear mag
Jaime Bergman (born 1975), Playboy's Playmate, January 1999, on the cover of Gear magazine, semi-baring her breast in a tattered shirt of US Flag imprint.
sara jessica parker tv-guide
Sex in the City queen Sarah Jessica Parker (born 1965).
smack down 200507
Fitness model Torrie Wilson (born 1975) on a wrestling magazine. “Made in America!” Her beautiful bare butt makes friend with a US flag. Note that care has been taken so that she doesn't actually sit on it.
jessica simpson GQ 200507
Pop songstress Jessica Simpson (born 1980) on GQ magazine, 2005-07. Note the tag line: GOD, THIS IS A GREAT COUNTRY and “Jessica Simpson and 75 Other Reasons To Love America”.
Bruce springsteen rolling stone
Bruce Springsteen on Rolling Stone. The date of this cover may be one of 1985-10-10, 1986-02-27, 1987-02-26.
hu magazine issue2002-07-00
Hustler magazine cover, 2002-07.

See also: Hustler's Flag Porn.

It is my guess that every American pop magazine has a flag-adorned cover once or more. The ones shown in this page are just the tip of a iceberg. If you spotted one, please let me know!

flag dressflag swimsuit

American Magazines